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Jehovah's Witnesses' literature teaches that their refusal of transfusions of whole blood or its four primary components—red cells, white cells, platelets, and plasma—is a non-negotiable religious stand and that those who respect life as a gift from God do not try to sustain life by taking in blood, [5] [6] even in an emergency. [7]
A blood substitute (also called artificial blood or blood surrogate) is a substance used to mimic and fulfill some functions of biological blood. It aims to provide an alternative to blood transfusion , which is transferring blood or blood-based products from one person into another.
During the early 1960s, American heart surgeon Denton Cooley successfully performed numerous bloodless open-heart surgeries on Jehovah's Witness patients. Fifteen years later, he and his associate published a report of more than 500 cardiac surgeries in this population, documenting that cardiac surgery could be safely performed without blood transfusion.
Ronald Lapin (1941–May 16, 1995) was an Israeli-born American surgeon, best known as a "bloodless surgeon" due to his willingness to perform surgeries on severely anemic Jehovah's Witness patients without the use of blood transfusions. He completed medical school in New York City and established his practice in Orange County, CA, in the 1970s ...
For religious reasons, Jehovah's Witnesses may choose not to accept any allogeneic transfusions from a volunteer's blood donation but may accept the use of autologous blood salvaged during surgery to restore their blood volume and homeostasis during the course of an operation, although not autologous blood donated beforehand. Each Jehovah's ...
Jehovah's Witnesses officially reject transfusions of whole allogeneic blood and some of its fractionated components. Jehovah's Witnesses are taught that the Bible prohibits the consumption, storage and transfusion of blood , based on their understanding of scriptures such as Leviticus 17:10, 11: "I will certainly set my face against the one ...
Jehovah's Witnesses typically refuse blood transfusions, which they consider a violation of God's law based on their interpretation of Acts 15:28, 29 and other scriptures. [279] [280] This prohibition has existed since 1945. [89] They also do not eat blood-based foods; one such prohibited dish is blood sausage. [281]
In all, Jehovah's Witnesses brought 23 separate First Amendment actions before the U.S. Supreme Court between 1938 and 1946. [36] [37] Supreme Court Justice Harlan Fiske Stone once quipped, "I think the Jehovah's Witnesses ought to have an endowment in view of the aid which they give in solving the legal problems of civil liberties." [38]